Table of Contents

  • ČENGĪZ KHAN

    David O. Morgan

    (Mong. Chinggis), probably born in 1167 in northeastern Mongolia, d. 1227, founder of the Mongol empire, the most extensive land empire known to history. Čengīz’s achievement, though hardly positive from the point of view of Persia, was by no means wholly a military and a destructive one. In the 1250s, a relatively coherent Mongol kingdom, the Il-khanate, was set up under Čengīz’s grandson Hülegü.

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  • CENSORING AN IRANIAN LOVE STORY

    Sara Khalili

    the first novel published in English by noted modernist writer Shahriar Mandanipour.

  • CENSORSHIP

    Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak

    (sānsūr) in Persia; censorship has been exercised in most societies, including Persia, by the religious establishment, by the political authority, and by unofficial groups.

  • CENSUS

    Firuz Tawfiq, Daniel Balland

    (Pers. sar-šomārī). No census for the purpose of ascertaining the population and acquiring statistical data was taken in Persia until the present century.

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  • CENSUS i. In Iran

    Fīrūz Tawfīq

    No census for the purpose of ascertaining the popu­lation and acquiring statistical data was taken in Persia until the present century, but information about num­bers of persons or families was sometimes collected for the purpose of fixing tax dues or conscript quotas. 

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  • CENSUS ii. In Afghanistan

    Daniel Balland

    The first national census of Afghanistan was not conducted until 1979, but the idea of such a survey had already taken root during the reign of Šēr-ʿAlī Khan in the 19th century, due to new taxation regulations.

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  • CENTRAL ASIA

    Multiple Authors

    This series of articles covers Central Asia. 

  • CENTRAL ASIA i. Geographical Survey

    EIr

    The central expanse of the Asian continent, the land mass situated approximately between 55° and 115° E and 25° and 50° N, comprises two geographically distinct areas.

  • CENTRAL ASIA ii. Demography

    Richard H. Rowland

    The combined population of the Uzbek, Kirgiz, Tajik, and Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republics totals more than 30 million people, one tenth of the population of the Soviet Union.

  • CENTRAL ASIA iii. In Pre-Islamic Times

    Richard N. Frye

    The main evidence for the history of Central Asia before the coming of Islam comes from archeological excavations, while written sources con­tain little information.

  • CENTRAL ASIA iv. In the Islamic Period up to the Mongols

    C. E. Bosworth

    In early Islamic times Persians tended to identify all the lands to the northeast of Khorasan and lying beyond the Oxus with the region of Turan, which in the Šāh-nāma of Ferdowsī is regarded as the land allotted to Ferēdūn’s son Tūr.

  • CENTRAL ASIA v. In the Mongol and Timurid Periods

    Bertold Spuler

    At the death of Čengīz (Chinggis) Khan in 624/1227 the territory he had conquered was divided between his sons.

  • CENTRAL ASIA vi. In the 16th-18th Centuries

    Robert D. McChesney

    In the 16th-17th centuries Central Asia, includ­ing Transoxania, Greater Balḵ, and Ḵᵛārazm, witnessed a neo-Chingizid (Jochid) political revival, spearheaded by the ʿArabshahid/Shibanid (Shaibanid) lineage in Ḵᵛārazm and the Abulkhairid/Shibanid and Toqay-Timurid lines in Transoxania and Greater Balḵ. In the main, political life was shaped by the neo-Chingizid appanage system of state and its internal dynamic.

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  • CENTRAL ASIA vii. In the 18th-19th Centuries

    Yuri Bregel

    By the beginning of the 12th/18th century Central Asia was in a state of a deepening political and economic crisis.

  • CENTRAL ASIA viii. Relations with Persia in the 19th Century

    Abbas Amanat

    The question of Central Asia in the 13th/19th century, from the Persian point of view, was a promi­nent one not only because of Persian territorial claims over Marv, Ḵīva, Saraḵs, and other peripheral regions, but also because of the threat of the Turkmen frontier tribes of Tekka, Yomūt, and Gūklān to the security of Khorasan, Astarābād, and Māzandarān.

  • CENTRAL ASIA ix. In the 20th Century

    Edward Allworth

    Technology brought by the Russian military and the colonial administration from Europe included advanced arms and material, as well as railroad, telegraph/telephone, and printed com­munication.

  • CENTRAL ASIA x. Economy Before the Timurids

    Peter B. Golden

    Climate and geography have, of course, in large measure determined economic pursuits in pre-industrial times.

  • CENTRAL ASIA xi. Economy from the Timurids until the 18th Century

    Robert D. McChesney

    The economy of Central Asia after the fall of Central Asia to the descendants of Čengīz Khan and during their rule was centered on agriculture, but with important contributions from pastoralism, especially the breeding and export of horses.

  • CENTRAL ASIA xii. Economy in the 19th-20th Centuries

    Ian Matley

    When the Russians arrived in Central Asia in the 1860s they found a predominantly agrarian economy. The main grain crops were wheat, barley, and sorghum.

  • CENTRAL ASIA xiii. Iranian Languages

    Ivan M. Steblin-Kamenskij

    Central Asia was the ancient homeland of the Iranians and therefore also of the Iranian languages.

  • CENTRAL ASIA xiv. Turkish-Iranian Language Contacts

    Gerhard Doerfer

    Three Turkish languages came together in Central Asia, the territory covered by the modern Turkmen, Uzbek, Kazakh, Kirghiz, and Tajik SSRs, excluding Chinese Turkestan: 1. the Uighur or Eastern Turks, 2. the Oghuz, speaking Khorasani Turkish, 3. and the Kipchaks

  • CENTRAL ASIA xv. Modern Literature

    Keith Hitchins

    Central Asian literatures in the twentieth century have developed under diverse influences. Beside classical and modern Persian literature and the poetic traditions and folklore of the Central Asian peoples themselves, Rus­sian thought and letters have been predominant.

  • CENTRAL ASIA xvi. Music

    Walter Feldman

    In modern times Central Asia as a musicological unit can be defined as the area extending from Afghanistan north of the Hindu Kush, all of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan in the west, Kirgizia and Chinese Turkestan in the east, and Kazakhstan in the north.

  • CENTRAL DIALECTS

    Gernot L. Windfuhr

    designation of a number of Iranian dialects spoken in the center of Persia, roughly between Hamadān, Isfahan, Yazd, and Tehran, that is, the area of ancient Media Major, which constitute the core of the western Iranian dialects.

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  • CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

    Mark J. Gasiorowski

    When the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was established in September 1947, its predecessors had been operating in Persia for a number of years.

  • CENTRAL TREATY ORGANIZATION

    Joseph A. Kechichian

    (CENTO), a mutual defense and economic cooperation pact among Persia, Turkey, and Pakistan, with the participation of the United Kingdom and the United States as associate members.

  • ČERĀḠ

    Mahmoud Omidsalar

    lamps. Various kinds of lamps were used in Persia before the introduction of electric light. The simplest and cheapest was the čerāḡ-e mūšī “mouse lamp,” so called probably because of its small size and poor light.

  • ČERĀḠ KHAN ZĀHEDĪ

    Roger M. Savory

    b. Shaikh Šarīf, a descendant of Shaikh Zāhed Gīlānī, the celebrated moršed (spiritual director) of Shaikh Ṣafī-al-Dīn, the eponymous founder of the Safavid order (Ṣafawīya); hence Čerāḡ Khan was also known as Pīrzāda.

  • ČERĀḠ-ʿALĪ KHAN SERĀJ-AL-MOLK ZANGANA

    Denis M. MacEoin

    (d. after 1281/1864-65), a leading govern­ment official during the early reign of Nāṣer-al-Dīn Shah.

  • ČERĀḠ-E DEHLĪ

    Sharif Husain Qasemi

    (b. at Avadh, ca. 675/1276-77; d. at Delhi, 18 Ramażān 757/14 September 1356), the title of Shaikh Naṣīr-al-Dīn Maḥmūd, the last of the five great early saints of the Indian Češtī order (see češtīya).

  • ČERĀḠ-E HEDĀYAT

    J. R. Perry

    (“lamp of guidance”), a monolingual Persian dictionary by the Indo-Muslim poet and scholar Serāj-al-Din ʿAli Khan Ārzu.

  • ČERĀḠĀNĪ

    Mahmoud Omidsalar

    (also čerāḡān, čerāḡbānī, čerāḡbārān), the decoration of buildings and open spaces with lights during festivals and on occasions like weddings, coronations, royal birthdays, circumcision ceremonies, and so on.

  • ČERĀḠHĀ RĀ MAN ḴĀMUŠ MIKONAM

    Elham Gheytanchi

    (I turn off the lights, Tehran, 2001), the first and most acclaimed novel by Zoya Pirzad (Zoyā Pirzād, b. Abadan, 1952), and the second to be penned by an Iranian-Armenian writer, after Ālice Ārezumāniān’s Hama az yek (All from one,Tehran, 1963).

  • ČERĀM

    Pierre Oberling

    or ČORŪM, a small tribal confederacy (īl) inhabiting the dehestān of Čerām, in the Kūhgīlūya region, in southwestern Persia.

  • CERAMICS

    Multiple Authors

    Ceramics in Persia from the Neolithic period to the 19th century.

  • CERAMICS i. The Neolithic Period through the Bronze Age in Northeastern and North-central Persia

    Robert H. Dyson

    The ceramic tradition of northeastern Persia devel­oped in parallel but distinct sequences in the Gorgān lowlands and the Dāmḡān highlands, including the parts of the Atrak region adjacent to both. 

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  • CERAMICS ii. The Neolithic Period in Northwestern Persia

    Mary M. Voigt

    The initial occupation of Persian Azerbaijan by farming groups took place in the second half of the 7th millennium B.C.E. The best known site of this period is Hajji Firuz (Ḥājī Fīrūz) Tepe, located in the Ošnū-­Soldūz valley and approximately contemporary with Hasanlu X (ca. 6000-5000 B.C.E.). 

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  • CERAMICS iii. The Neolithic Period in Central and Western Persia

    Peder Mortensen

    Present knowledge is based primarily on evidence from three excavated sites and from surveys carried out southwest of Harsīn, on the Māhī­dašt plain, and in the Holaylān valley.

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  • CERAMICS iv. The Chalcolithic Period in the Zagros Highlands

    Elizabeth F. Henrickson

    The Zagros Chalcolithic may be divided into Early, Middle, and Late subperiods. Within each several distinctive regional assemblages are known in varying arche­ological detail. 

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  • CERAMICS v. The Chalcolithic Period in Southern Persia

    Thomas W. Beale

    The most fully excavated corpus of ceramics from the Chalcolithic of southern Persia comes from Tal-i Iblis and Tepe Yahya. Ex­tensive surface collections by Sir Mark Aurel Stein in Baluchistan and more recently have provided important supplementary material.

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  • CERAMICS vi. Uruk, Proto-Elamite, and Early Bronze Age in Southern Persia

    William M. Sumner

    Lapui common ware consists of a red paste tempered with rather coarse black grit. It is not as well fired as the fine ware, and frequently the sherds reveal an unoxidized gray core. 

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  • CERAMICS vii. The Bronze Age in Northwestern, Western, and Southwestern Persia

    Robert C. Henrickson

    During the 3rd millennium BCE there were two major ceramic traditions in northwestern Persia, shifting ceramic traditions in central western Persia, and polychrome ware  in northern Susiana.

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  • CERAMICS viii. The Early Bronze Age in Southwestern and Southern Persia

    Elizabeth Carter

    The ceramic repertoire of the 2nd millennium B.C.E. in Ḵūzestān is dominated by plain buff-ware forms, the development of which can be traced through approximately 1,000 years, with four major sub­divisions. The most common and long-lived forms are illustrated in this article.

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  • CERAMICS ix. The Bronze Age in Northeastern Persia

    Serge Cleuziou

    Archeologists have traditionally linked the ap­pearance of burnished gray wares at Tepe Hissar (Ḥeṣār) and Tureng (Tūrang) Tepe in Gorgān during the second half of the 4th millennium b.c., and their possible diffusion westward in the first half of the 2nd millennium.

  • CERAMICS x. The Iron Age

    Robert C. Henrickson

    The pottery of Iron Age Persia presents a vast array of problems, not least the huge area and long span of time that must be taken into consideration.

  • CERAMICS xi. The Achaemenid Period

    Remy Boucharlat and Ernie Haerinck

    Although information on architecture and sculpture at major Achaemenid sites in Persia is plentiful, knowl­edge of the pottery of this period is almost totally lacking.

  • CERAMICS xii. The Parthian and Sasanian Periods

    Remy Boucharlat and Ernie Haerinck

    the distribution pattern of pottery characterized by a wide range of different techniques and styles was quite complex, probably owing to diverse environments that have traditionally been reflected in major differences in the material culture of Persia.

  • CERAMICS xiii. The Early Islamic Period, 7th-11th Centuries

    David Whitehouse

    Early Islamic pottery has been found in two main regions of Persia: Ḵūzestān and the Persian Gulf and the Persian plateau, including Khorasan. Study of all Islamic pottery of the first four hundred years has been dominated by the finds from Sāmarrā in Meso­potamia.

  • CERAMICS xiv. The Islamic Period, 11th-15th centuries

    Ernst J. Grube

    A large variety of pottery types from different parts of the country has been attributed to this general period, notably incised and slip-carved earthenwares, which have been published under a variety of labels, as proper attributions have so far been impossible.

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  • CERAMICS xv. The Islamic Period, 16th-19th centuries

    Yolande Crowe

    Although several European travelers to Persia in the 17th century reported active potteries at some cities, there are no detailed records that would assist in attributing specific pieces surviving from the rule of the Safavid dynasty (1501­-1732) to any one of them.

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  • CEREALS

    Cross-Reference

    See under individual cereals.

  • ČERĪK

    Willem Floor

    (also jerīk, from Mongol tserig “warrior[s]”), originally troops sent by an individual or camp (yort) to serve in the royal army.

  • ČERKES

    Cross-Reference

    See ČARKAS.

  • CERULLI, Enrico

    Filippo Bertotti

    (born Naples, 15 February 1898; died 1988), Italian orientalist and diplomat.

  • CERVIDAE

    Cross-Reference

    See ĀHŪ.

  • CEŠT

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    a small settlement on the north bank of the Harirud and to the south of the Paropamisus range in northwestern Afghanistan, lying approximately 100 miles upstream from Herat in the easternmost part of the modern Herat welāyat or province.

  • ČEŠTĪYA

    Gerhard Böwering

    the name of an influential Sufi order in India, derived from the name of the village of Češt.

  • CHAARENE

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    (Gk. Chaarēnḗ), in Achaemenid times one of the easternmost Iranian provinces and the one closest to India.

  • CHAGHATAY LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

    Gerhard Doerfer

    Of all the Turkic languages Chaghatay enjoyed by far the greatest prestige. For instance, the khans of the Golden Horde and of the Crimea, as well as the Kazan Tatars, wrote in Chaghatay much of the time.

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  • CHAGHATAYID DYNASTY

    Peter Jackson

    name given to the descendants of Čengīz Khan’s second son Čaḡatai, who reigned in Transoxania until ca. 771/1370 and in parts of Turkestan down to the 11th/17th century.

  • CHALAVID DYNASTY

    Cross-Reference

    See ĀL-E AFRĀSĪĀB.

  • CHALCOLITHIC ERA

    Elizabeth F. Henrickson

    in Persia; chalcolithic is a term adopted for the Near East early in this century as part of an attempt to refine the framework of cultural developmental “stages” (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze, and Iron Ages) and used by students of western European prehistory.

  • CHALDEANS

    Muhammad Dandamayev

    (Kaldu), West Semitic tribes of southern Babylonia attested in Assyrian texts from the early 9th century B.C.

  • CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, INDUSTRIES, AND MINES OF PERSIA

    Ahmad Ashraf

    a national federation of local chambers and syndicates created in Esfand 1348 Š./March 1970 through the merger of various local chambers of commerce and the national chamber of industries and mines of Iran.

  • CHAMBER of GUILDS

    Ahmad Ashraf

    (Oṭāq-e aṣnāf), a federation of various guilds formed in 1350 Š./1971 under the “guild-organization act” (Qānūn-e neẓām-e ṣenfī) in most urban centers.

  • CHAMBERLAIN

    Cross-Reference

    See ḤĀJEB.

  • CHAMPION, JOSEPH

    Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak and Estelle Whelan

    (1750-ca. 1813), English poet and translator. His three books devoted to Persian litera­ture were all first published in India. The earliest contains English odes in imitation of the poems of Ḥāfeẓ, mostly on the theme of wine and drinking.

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  • CHĀNGĀ ĀSĀ

    Mary Boyce and Firoze M. Kotwal

    an eminent Parsi layman who lived in the 15th-16th centuries A.D. at Navsari in Gujarat.

  • CHARACENE and CHARAX

    John Hansman

    (Spasinou) in pre-Islamic times; Characene is the name Pliny gives for the later region of Mesene (called Mēšān or Mēšūn in Middle Persian, Maysān/Mayšān in Syriac, and Maysān in Arabic) in southernmost Mesopotamia, which formed a political district of that name in the Seleucid, Parthian, and Sasanian periods.

  • CHARAX

    A. Shapur Shahbazi

    town in the Seleucid and Parthian province of Rhagiana, the area around modern Ray.

  • CHARCOAL

    Willem Floor

    car­bonized wood and other vegetal material, an important household and industrial fuel in Persia and Afghanistan.

  • CHARDIN, Sir JOHN

    John Emerson

    (born Paris, 16 November 1643, died Chiswick, London? 5 January 1713), an Huguenot jeweler who traveled extensively in Asia and wrote the most detailed foreign account of the Persia of his time.

  • CHARES of MITYLENE

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    Greek historiographer, who participated in Alexander’s expedition and wrote “Stories about Alexander” (Perì Aléxandron historíai), of which fragments remain.

  • CHARIOT

    William W. Malandra

    chariots in ancient Iran were light horse-drawn, two-wheeled vehicles designed for speed and maneuverability in battle and races.

  • CHARITABLE FOUNDATIONS

    Maria Macuch; John R. Hinnells, Mary Boyce, and Shahrokh Shahrokh

    (MPers. ruwānagān lit. “relating to the soul”), pious endow­ments to benefit the souls of the dead, as specified by the individual founders.  i. In the Sasanian period.  ii. Among Zoroastrians in Islamic times.

  • CHARMS

    Mahmoud Omidsalar

    originally verbal formulas recited to prevent or ward off potential harm by magical power but now also denoting written and even talismanic magic.

  • CHARON OF LAMPSACUS

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    Greek historiographer, son of Pytho­cles or Pythes.

  • CHARPENTIER, JARL

    Bo Utas

    (Hellen Robert Toussaint; b. 17 December 1884, d. 5 July 1935), Swedish Indologist, Indo-Europeanist, and Iranist, born in Gothenburg as the son of an army officer.

  • CHASE

    Cross-Reference

    See HUNTING IN IRAN.

  • CHASE, THORNTON

    Moojan Momen

    (b. Springfield, Mass., 22 February 1847), regarded by Bahais as the first Amer­ican Bahai and the first Bahai of the West.

  • CHAVANNES, EMMANUEL-ÉDOUARD

    Werner Sundermann

    (b. Lyons, France, 5 October 1865, d. Fontenay-aux-Roses, 29 January 1918), French sinologist who also contributed to the study of Iranian history and religions.

  • CHEESE

    Daniel Balland

    In Persia and Afghanistan both nomadic pastoralists and sedentary peasants make the same basic kinds of domestic cheese. The only clear distinction is between acid and rennet cheeses, both made from mixed milks, except in Gīlān; there acid cheeses are usually prepared from cow’s and buffalo’s milk and rennet cheeses from ewe’s and goat’s milk.

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  • CHEMISTRY

    Cross-Reference

    See KĪMĪĀ.

  • CHESS

    Bo Utas, Moḥammad Dabīrsīāqī

    a board game.

  • CHESTER BEATTY LIBRARY

    Wilfrid Lockwood, J. T. P. de Bruijn, Michel Tardieu

    a collection of manuscripts, printed works, and artifacts, predominantly Oriental, assembled by Alfred Chester Beatty and opened to the public in Dublin in 1954.

  • CH’IEN HAN SHU

    Edwin G. Pulleyblank

    (Qian Han shu) “History of the Former Han Dynasty,” a historical work which includes information on Iran.

  • CHILAS

    Karl Jettmar

    township in the upper Indus valley in Pakistani-controlled Jammu and Kashmir, almost directly south of Gilgit and located on the new Karakorum high­way between Pakistan and China.

  • CHILDREN

    Multiple Authors

    This series of articles covers children and child-rearing in Iran and Iranian lands.

  • CHILDREN i. Childbirth in Zoroastrianism

    Jenny Rose

    The Zoroastrian community has traditionally regarded marriage as having a threefold function: to propagate the human race, to spread the Zoroastrian faith, and to contribute to the victory of the good cause. The birth of a child furthers each of these objec­tives.

  • CHILDREN ii. In Modern Persian Folklore

    Mahmoud Omidsalar

    Childbirth (zāymān, formal ważʿ-e ḥaml) in traditional Persian society, as in many other cultures, has generally been associated with magical practices and superstitions.

  • CHILDREN iii. Legal Rights of Children in the Sasanian Period

    Mansour Shaki

    Although the corpus of Sasanian civil law was designed primarily to regulate matters among the lower classes, that is, the common people and slaves, the portions on adop­tion, inheritance, guardianship, and the like were equally applicable to the upper classes.

  • CHILDREN iv. Legal Rights of Children in Modern Persia

    Shirin Ebadi

    A person is consid­ered a minor (ṣaḡīr) until he or she has attained the physical and psychological growth necessary for full participation in society. When a child has reached the age of maturity (bolūḡ) determined by the law he ir she is consid­ered mature (bāleḡ).

  • CHILDREN v. Child Rearing in Modern Persia

    Erika Friedl

    The topic of child rearing (from birth to social adulthood in the mid-teens) is largely neglected in systematic research; there are no comparative studies of child-rearing practices among different ethnic and cultural groups in the country and only a few specialized studies.

  • CHILDREN vi. Child Rearing Among Zoroastrians in Modern Persia

    Janet Kestenberg Amighi

    In the first half of the 13th/20th century most children were born at home with the assistance of the midwife. Immediately after birth the infant was bathed to cleanse it of polluting substances and wrapped in pieces of cloth called landog.

  • CHILDREN vii. Children's Literature

    EIr

    Up to the Constitutional movement the standard curriculum of traditional Persian elementary schools (maktabs), which were pri­vately operated, included the alphabet, the Koran, selec­tions from popular Persian poetry and prose, and the traditional sciences. 

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  • CHILIARCH

    Philippe Gignoux

    Greek title of one of the chief offices of state in Achaemenid Persia, presumably translated from Old Persian hazārapati-, attested in Greek as azarapateîs, explained as eisaggeleîs, that is, announcers or ushers.

  • CHINESE TURKESTAN

    Multiple Authors

    (Sinkiang, Xinjiang), IRANIAN ELEMENTS IN.

  • CHINESE TURKESTAN i. Geographical Overview

    EIr

    The eastern portion of the Central Asian land mass (see central asia i. geography), between 70° and 100° E and 25° and 45° N, encompasses Chinese Turkestan, now Sinkiang (Xin-jiang) Uighur Autonomous Region of the People’s Republic of China.

  • CHINESE TURKESTAN ii. In Pre-Islamic Times

    Victor Mair and Prods Oktor Skjærvø

    In antiquity the Tarim and Dzungar (Zungar, Jungar) basins lay at the crossroads of three main Eurasian routes including the Southern Silk Road, the Northern Silk Road, and a northern route passing between the Bogdo-ola (Bo-ko-tuo) range and the Tien Shans.

  • CHINESE TURKESTAN iii. From the Advent of Islam to the Mongols

    Isenbike Togan

    Chinese influence in the Tarim basin began to wane after the battle of Talas (Ṭarāz) in 134/751, though Islam did not gain a permanent foothold there until much later.